High-Tech Firms to Ask Congress
To Ease Immigration Restrictions

WASHINGTON -- Texas Instruments Inc., Microsoft Corp. and other computer giants will ask Congress Wednesday to ease immigration restrictions on skilled workers, an issue that has divided the Clinton administration.

Under current law, the number of skilled foreign workers allowed to enter the U.S. is capped at 65,000 a year. Largely employed in the computer and health-care industries, they receive temporary visas that allow them to work in the U.S. for as many as six years. As the U.S. labor market has tightened in recent...